Sudden Death (21 page)

“On the surface of it, yes. Sometimes our profession makes me sick. Martin Kuzirian calls himself a journalist.” Jane pushed her food around her plate. “If I sit quietly like a doodlebug, sooner or later the guilty piss ant will fall in the trap.”

“In the meantime, Doodlebug, I feel like we’re rearranging deck chairs on the
Titanic
.”

Blissfully ignorant, Carmen walked on the court for her match. Since the condominiums were near the courts, she could bypass the locker room, dress in her room, and walk on court. When her name was announced the applause was healthy; there was a snicker here and there, but she didn’t notice it. Trixie Wescott, beribboned, didn’t look Carmen in the face but again, that wasn’t unusual. Most players didn’t want to look an opponent in the face, not right before trying to flatten her. Miranda Mexata was in control as always.

During the warm-up, Harriet noticed she was the object
of certain scrutiny. She told herself it was, of course, her celestial beauty that attracted the furtive as well as outright gazes. The only trouble was, Harriet was not a celestial beauty. Then she wondered if she evidenced signs of bubonic plague. Harriet sat there and wondered what in hell was going on.

Siggy Wayne was all beshit and forty miles from water. Lavinia Sibley Archer, rattled but cool, spent precious energy on him.

“Chrysler. There goes Chrysler.”

“Siggy, get hold of yourself. You’re acting like Chicken Little.”

“You don’t think sponsors will pull out on us for this? Large ha. Who do I get now? Mack trucks?”

“Shut up and let me think.” Lavinia rarely spoke so directly in the vernacular.

Siggy shut up. Lavinia paced the room. She tacked a Do Not Disturb sign on the office door. How long that would be respected she didn’t know. The players would respect it for a while, but the press was another matter.

Unable to stay quiet for more than two minutes, Siggy spoke again. “Carmen must publicly deny she’s a lesbian.”

“I thought of that. She’ll lie because she has to. Besides, I’ve never seen a lesbian yet ready to say she was one. Carmen’s no different. She’ll give us our press conference.”

“What else is there to worry about? Sponsors are the game, Lavinia. The fans might come because they love tennis, but the sponsors won’t. Oh, why did this have to happen now? I’m to sign the Chrysler contract next week.”

She corrected him, “We’re to sign the contract next week.”

“That’s what I meant.”

“H-m-m.” She examined him as though he were under a microscope. “You’d never have won Wimbledon, Siggy.”

“I’m not athletic.”

“What I mean is you’ve got to stay cool. The worse the situation, the more cool you become. Concentration, Siggy, concentration.”

“This isn’t fucking Wimbledon. This is business!”

“I won’t have you speaking that way in front of me.”

“Sorry, I forgot myself.”

“We can contain the lesbian issue, I think. We’ve got to convince Carmen to throw it all on Harriet. I shall speak to her, and I’ll see that Seth Quintard speaks to her.”

“You forgot. She fired Seth. Miguel had a hand in that, you can be sure.”

“Now, will Harriet accept the blame?” Lavinia put her finger alongside her nose, tapped it once, and then declared, “Yes. She loves Carmen. She can leave the tour and find a quiet job somewhere.”

Siggy looked surprised. “A job? The woman is a college professor. She won’t get hired in the heart of San Francisco after this scandal.”

“She can always be a secretary,” Lavinia sniffed.

“A secretary with a Ph.D.? The woman will be branded for the rest of her life, Lavinia.”

“She can join the gay rights movement and be their leader.” Lavinia drummed her fingertips together.

“The wages for martyrdom are zip.”

“What’s the matter with you?” Lavinia sharply demanded.

“It seems cruel, but …” His voice faded.

“You’re the one screaming about sponsors.”

“I know.”

“I, for one, will be good and glad to get rid of Harriet Rawls. Since she was stupid enough to tell the truth, the rest
is her own doing. We put the blame on her. What happens to a homosexual is of no concern to me—or you. She takes the blame!”

“You’re asking a lot.”

“I don’t have to ask anything. Carmen Semana will do the asking. Tennis means more to her than Harriet. You ought to know that about tennis players. They sacrifice their mothers and fathers first, their husbands and wives next, and then they go for their children.”

“Did you do that?” For once Siggy was taken aback.

“I married after my career. Times were different then.”

“I’ll call Chrysler and smooth things over. You call Howard Dominick.”

“No, Siggy. Let it ride. Nothing may come of this. There’s no reason in our calling attention to it by overreacting. If they call us, we’ll discuss it. If not, let’s act as though nothing much has happened. Remember it’s Harriet who’s in the electric chair, not Carmen and not women’s tennis.”

“Okay.”

“Why don’t you watch the match and see how it goes?” Before he could agree she announced, “We didn’t have homosexuals when I played competitively.”

“Lavinia, you can’t believe that.”

“If we had them, they didn’t say they were. It amounts to the same thing.”

Carmen shook Trixie’s hand. She’d beaten the thirteen-year-old without much trouble. Siggy Wayne stood at courtside. He grabbed her arm as she trotted off.

“Follow me. No press conference today. I’m taking you back to your condominium.”

Harriet observed this and assumed he was taking Carmen
to the press tent. She decided to return to the condo ahead of them.

“Did you read Martin Kuzirian’s column today?” Siggy asked Carmen.

“No, but then I never read his column.”

Siggy retrieved the clipping from his pocket. As they walked back to the condominium, Carmen read while he fended off people. Lavinia hadn’t told him to escort Carmen, but he thought it was a good idea.

Carmen’s expression changed from blank uninterest to fury. She crumpled up the paper and handed it back to Siggy. He put the ball back in his pocket. “Bastard!”

“All is not lost. We can work this out.”

Carmen didn’t hear him. She was thinking of committing the perfect murder.

“This doesn’t have to be a scandal.”

“What?”

These kids, Siggy thought. Airheads, every one. “I said this doesn’t have to be a disaster.” They arrived at the condo. “Let’s go inside and talk this out.”

Carmen reached in her racquet cover for the key. She couldn’t find it. She knocked on the door twice. Harriet called from inside, “Who is it?”

“Me—and Siggy.”

Harriet opened the door. Siggy was the last person she wanted to see, now or at any time. The brief walk she and Carmen took the other day was their only time together except for sleep.

“Read this.” Siggy placed the ball of newsprint in Harriet’s hand. Without being asked, he sat down. Carmen found her cigarettes and lit one.

Harriet finished the viperous article and returned it to Siggy in better shape than she found it. “The price of fame.”

“As long as Carmen doesn’t have to pay it.” Subtlety was unknown to Siggy. “Think of her reputation in Argentina.”

“What’s that mean?” Carmen glowered.

“It means you’ve got to deny all this, and Harriet’s got to pack off. Until things cool off, of course.”

“Siggy, I think you’d better leave. We need to talk between ourselves.”

“This is business, Harriet. I don’t think you understand.”

“I understand that you have no regard for Carmen and me as a couple. If we had two kids, one station wagon, and three pet hamsters, you’d never dream of sitting in our living room after a bomb like this had been dropped on us. Please leave.”

“Oh.” He stood up and headed for the door. As he turned the doorknob, he said to Carmen, “Call me after you two talk. We’ve got to decide what you’ll say to the press. They won’t leave you alone, that’s for certain.” He left thinking it was Harriet who had bad manners.

The phone rang. Carmen took the call, listened, answered with terse replies, then hung up.

“More bad news?” Harriet’s voice was dead.

“George Gibson, my lawyer. He’s worried about my green card.”

“The article said I was a lesbian, not you.”

Carmen stared into nowhere and said, “Would you love me if I didn’t play tennis?”

“Yes. I loved you the day I met you, and I’ll love you until the day I die. I don’t care what you do, as long as you can look in the mirror and be proud of yourself. Isn’t that what’s important?”

“You’re not going home. Fuck Siggy.”

“I think we’ve had enough upset for one day. Let’s play a hand of 500 rum. We can apply ourselves to my brand-new public lesbianism later.”

“I wish I had let you beat the shit out of the creep,” Carmen said.

“Then he’d call me a communist, a child molester, a dope
addict. Is there anything left in the lexicon of ills? In his little mind, I think homosexuality ranks with such horrors.”

“I don’t understand. I try to figure it all out, but I can’t. We aren’t hurting anybody. We work. We pay our taxes. But we’re criminals? I don’t get it.”

“Neither do I.” Harriet shuffled the cards.

If bad luck follows its nose to the grave, Miguel had his first whiff of that foul odor. Sauntering back to his condominium, he passed Beanie Kitteridge. Normally buoyant, her behavior tipped him off. When he questioned her, he discovered the bad news. As soon as he was in his room, he read the column. It was a disaster by implication.

Miguel paced. He had to clean up his sister’s act, but how? If a scandal of major proportions erupted, the clothing wouldn’t sell. Miguel and an innocent Carmen would be staring down a $600,000 debt. If that wasn’t bad enough, she could lose her legitimate contracts. They might not cut her off immediately; they simply wouldn’t renew. He didn’t know if he could rustle up new ones. Carmen could become endorsement poison.

Finally he picked up the phone. “Migueletta, come over. We need to talk.”

“I’m relaxing.”

“Get over here.”

Carmen wanted Harriet to accompany her but Harriet knew this was strictly between brother and sister. Fearfully, Carmen opened the door to her brother’s condominium. A breeze stirred the surrounding foliage.